Twitter is ridiculous. That is not to say that I won’t tweet for marketing purposes.
And I do pop in from time to time to lurk, a voyeur who finds some of the things celebs and other folks post fascinating. And I almost always like what Guy Kawasaki and his ghost-tweeters post.
But usually, Twitter content is silly.
My husband notes that it takes a pretty big ego to believe that others care about what you are doing every minute of your life. Which is what a lot of Twitter and Facebook postings cover. And probably why celebutards like Ashton Kutcher and Diddy are master-tweeters.
Do we really care what someone is having for lunch? or what music they are listening to? Or that they just finished a workout? Do we want to see a photo of Kutcher’s wife bending over in her panties?
M’s right.
The image management that goes on among some who participate in social media is particularly amusing. Such posts as “am settled in my easy chair with a single-malt scotch reading Proust” crack me up. (Yeah, right, you de man!)
A few of my Facebook friends post this kind of crap. It’s especially amusing when the wine they say they’re so elegantly sipping is actually the equivalent of two-buck-chuck. And they don’t know it. They think they look so suave, but the unintended effect is an image of them in fake ascot drinking brown-bag wine Ripple. Not what they had in mind.
Twitter is really just a cross between a big AOL chat room and instant messaging.
There are Twitter “cliques” (whenever I see the term “Twitter family” I throw up a little in my mouth) and people have running conversations together. Like we did in AOL chat rooms. Back in the day.
But at 140 characters per tweet, it’s less efficient. It’s hard to follow the stream unless you’re sitting in front of the screen all day.
I can’t figure out why people do this. How they find the time. And why they think it’s a fulfilling way to interact with people.
Because it seems like massive amounts of time to be hooked to the screen. Instead of out living.
Right now, it’s a craze. But I feel sure that Twitter is going to fade away in time, just like AOL chat rooms did. Because it has no intrinsic value.
There has to be some interesting research in communications grad schools all over the nation. Am dying to read some social psych dissertations on this topic.
I think it’s ridiculous to sit and watch it all day too, but (perhaps oddly), I *do* find it interesting what people I care about are eating for lunch (especially if they include recipes) or what their latest craft project is or how their son did at his basketball game…it’s having a conversation the same way as on FB, really, only you don’t have to let people *too* much into your life to have it (i.e., via a FB friend request).
But if you don’t enjoy that personal aspect, on a professional level, it’s also about personal branding and relationship-building. For example: people read my blog, yes, but with Twitter, they get even more of my personality; they write to me; I write back; relationships are formed…readership grows, and so on.
Also? Blog fodder! For instance, my tweet about favorite Italian-set movie/books the other day got probably close to 70 or 80 responses between FB and Twitter…and basically just wrote a blog post for me *with* ideas of what products to link to in my Amazon store.
That said, I guess you either like it or you don’t, but me, I’ll tweet probably till after it’s cool. Bottom line? It’s fun 😀
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Twitter is really just a cross between a big AOL chat room and instant messaging.
Right now, it’s a craze. But I feel sure that Twitter is going to fade away in time, just like AOL chat rooms did. Because it has no intrinsic value.
I think it’s ridiculous to sit and watch it all day too, but (perhaps oddly), I *do* find it interesting what people I care about are eating for lunch (especially if they include recipes) or what their latest craft project is or how their son did at his basketball game…it’s having a conversation the same way as on FB, really, only you don’t have to let people *too* much into your life to have it (i.e., via a FB friend request).
But if you don’t enjoy that personal aspect, on a professional level, it’s also about personal branding and relationship-building. For example: people read my blog, yes, but with Twitter, they get even more of my personality; they write to me; I write back; relationships are formed…readership grows, and so on.
Also? Blog fodder! For instance, my tweet about favorite Italian-set movie/books the other day got probably close to 70 or 80 responses between FB and Twitter…and basically just wrote a blog post for me *with* ideas of what products to link to in my Amazon store.
That said, I guess you either like it or you don’t, but me, I’ll tweet probably till after it’s cool. Bottom line? It’s fun 😀